Pack Rats and Garbage Heaps
by Ruby Silverstone
Summary: It was just one of those days that you could only ever describe as mediocre. In the end, maybe that's what made it special. A series of short snap-shots into the life of an orphaned Sakura, a determined Hidan, and a group of increasingly enthralled high class criminals turned parents. Such is the adventures of life.
1. Chapter 1

Pack Rats and Garbage Heaps

Theme I: Impulse

It was just one of those days, he figured. Not the kind that made you want to do something, not the kind that was just shitty by nature, but the kind that had absolutely nothing remarkable about it. The weather could be sunshine and rainbows or five mph short of a hurricane and somehow, _somehow, _you would still describe it as mediocre. As the man lumbered down the street in a semi-casual almost-slouching manner, he wondered just where these days came from. Because besides being able to be completely forgettable, these also happened to be the days that he found himself the most restless. Or, restless in a sense that he figured it would be good for him to just leave the house out of boredom.

So that's how, on a day bordering between spring and summer, did he find himself walking through the pointlessly winding sidewalk of the city park. The oaks around him were tall and leafy, spreading splotches of shade on the evergreen grass spaces that were neatly trimmed. Far on one end of the park stood a playground in a pit made covered in woodchips and the shriek of laughing children penetrated the air, and by default his ears, even at his current distance. The entire thing was rather scenic, and he grimaced at the thought. He mildly thought if his companions saw him now, they would too.

In short, he did not fit his surroundings. Dressed in ratty dark denim jeans that appeared to have gone through a knife fight, a black muscle shirt, and black combat boots, he marched down the sidewalk and turned a few heads. His silver hair was long and slicked back with enough gel that he could be considered a greaser, even though the term had gone extinct a while back, and many of his tattoos sported crude terms or language that made many cringe. His black leather jacket was slung over one shoulder, two of his fingers hooked in its collar to keep it in place, and the other hand was shoved deep within his pant pockets, fingering the switch blade that he always carried on his person.

A few mothers noticed him and pulled their children in a subtle, but protective maneuver that placed them well out of his reach and out of his line of sight. He paid them little mind; things like that were common in places like this. At least when he was around. He snorted. His usual companion had it worse than he did.

As he walked through this unremarkable day, he spied something that wasn't entirely…normal. Naturally, seeing potential to make this day something of a day and less of a limbo, he gravitated towards a gathering of children. They paid him little heed, their little heads turning this way and that as their chubby fingers pointed out things that they found interesting. The two women that were watching the group of…say, twelve children were far too busy with their tasks to notice him. So he contented himself with leaning up against a tree and watching the small ameba of tiny bodies swivel in and out of an abstract shape. The women seemed frazzled, distracted even, as they tried to garner attention and conduct a game. He found it strange that such a gathering was occurring. School was out for the year and he didn't know of any local organizations that would prompt a field trip, so he wondered just who they were. Eventually, they got the children to settle down in a circle for a round of duck-duck-goose, but that wasn't what really held his attention anymore.

Instead, it was an even smaller group of children, four by the looks of it, hiding themselves beyond a cluster of bushes and the obstructing view of the only weeping willow in the park. He tilted his head at them curiously, their heads coming into view periodically like little specks of color amongst the green. He knew they were from the first group of people because, hey all the other kids were attacking the playground and the only other people around were him and an elderly couple napping on a bench. Napping or dead. He couldn't tell. But the fact remains that they obviously were a good distance away, and obviously didn't want to be seen. So, obviously, he made his way over to them in a languid fashion, making himself out to be a harmless passerby just out for a stroll. He pulled it off rather well and before he knew it, he was within earshot, but out of sight, of the children.

He didn't like what he was hearing.

"You're such a stupid girl!"

"Yeah, you can't do anything right!"

"I haven't done anything wrong!"

"Stupid!"

"What kind of freak has pink hair?"

"It's not my fault! I don't—"

"I bet your parents were freaks too. They probably had four arms—"

"And eight eyes!"

"Like a spider!"

The insults rose to a crescendo until they were nearly shrieking, three with glee, and the fourth with a pitiful mix of anger and sadness. The man wrinkled his nose. He wasn't one to bother other people's business, certainly not children's at that, but something made him move around so he could see the situation clearly. Call it impulse, he supposed.

The sight that greeted him had caused a severe case of déjà-vu. Under the mournful watch of the willow, three children had backed a fourth into the tree trunk, placed in a semi-circle around her. Two of the attackers were girls, and the third was a sniveling boy who looked mighty uncomfortable being there but was feeding off of the bullying and creating a false bravado that didn't suit him. The girl they were picking on, though, is what was _really _catching his attention. She stood rigid and firm, like a tiny ball of stress just ready to be released and zing all over a room, her tiny hands balled into fists, and a shock of bright pink hair shadowing her face. He didn't have to see it to know she was grinding her teeth, he'd done the same thing when people pissed him off as a kid.

The ring leader, a girl with long brown hair and a scowl set upon her features was standing with her hands on her hips, leaning forward to deliver a round of scathing remarks that stunned the man for a moment. Since when did children even know what a whore was? And since when did they have the maturity to properly deliver insults in the manner that they were? As far as he knew, that kind of verbal sparring was left to middle-school kids and up, not four to five year olds. He scowled in confusion and aggravation, personally thinking that back when he was a kid, he would've just popped the girl and knocked out a few teeth. But as angry as the pink haired child looked, he sincerely doubted that she would. Girls didn't really do that sort of thing. Just when he decided that he would go over there and scare some sense into the bullies, because honestly it was like a scene from his own childhood, they drew the final straw.

"Ha! I bet you're too weak to stand up for yourself. I bet that's why your mommy and daddy left you. They thought you were weak! The weak freak! That's why you didn't even have a na—"

_WHAM!_

The man was startled to find that, despite her small frame, the girl could pack quite a punch. The blow sounded like someone had just swung a board rather than a bony fist, and evidently the victim shared his thoughts. Or, at least the sentiment. The ring leader burst into tears, her cohorts suddenly very nervous in the face of the terror that lay before them. The pink haired girl was breathing heavily, her fist still clenched and white knuckled and her stance wide. Blazing green eyes were shadowed by the tree, and she looked all too ready for a fight. With a brazen stomp of her foot and a lung, she yelled at them. "Get!"

They fled easily, stumbling into one another as they hustled back to the relative safety of the supervising women, wailing like banshees all the way. The man let out a low whistle, causing the girl to whirl to him with a frightened intake of air. He studied her at a distance, from her boyishly cut hair, to the plain grey shirt and ragged jean shorts, to a pair of ratty tennis shoes that looked like they'd played the hand-me-down game far too long. She looked to him with startled, wide green eyes before turning at the sound of an angry call. "Koharu!"

The man watched passively from his spot a fair distance away as one of the two women stalked angrily up to the girl. "Koharu! What have I told you about hurting other people?"

"It wasn't my fault!"

"Not your fault? Then who hit Yui? Are you telling me that wasn't you?"

The girl was silent, giving a sound between a whimper and a grunt when the woman took her arm and began to half drag half lead the girl away. "We've talked about this Koharu, and it can't happen anymore!"

"She was calling me names! Why do I always get into trouble? She _deserved _it!"

"You can't just hit people when you're angry." Hidan snorted at that. Funny, whenever he'd tried it they never came back for more. The girl seemed to voice his opinions. "They told me I was a freak and that my parents didn't want me. Well maybe that's true but they didn't want her either and I bet it _was because of her big. Fat. MOUTH!_" At the end she pitched her voice so that her attacker could clearly hear every word she said, to which she responded with bursting into tears. The woman rounded on the little girl, harshly shaking her arm in a bruising grip as the other children were rounded up. The man watched this all with an air of apparent indifference. On the inside, though, he watched the girl with ever familiar eyes.

After a moment of contemplation, he followed them until he'd caught up with one of the women, the one that hadn't reprimanded the pink haired girl called Koharu. "Hey!" she turned to him after putting a child back on the ground from her hip. After her eyes had raked him from head to toe, she smiled a smile that he was used to seeing. Deceptively polite but inwardly saying that she really didn't want to talk to him. He wrinkled his nose at her but stifled the urge to bare his teeth. Instead, he asked a question. "You guy's some kind of an organization? It looks like a field trip but schools out."

The woman gave that same smile again, although a little more acrid at his brusque way of questioning. "Yes, we are an organization and this is a bit of a field trip. We're with the Konoha Orphanage, and I'm one of the supervisors." He stared after the retreating children in a new light before turning back to the woman who had changed her expression to match one of impatience thinly veiled by civility. He nodded his thanks and walked away, throwing one last glance at the pink haired girl and drifted into a contemplative silence.

Four days later he stood in front of a window, peering out at a small playground as a nice looking lady praised various children on their behavior, politely informing him on ones that his eyes lingered on a little too much. He thought it was a bit creepy and belatedly realized that she had sharp eyes, either that or she'd been doing this a little too long. The children were ignorant of his perusal and continued on with their small games during the recess they were granted. Upon entering the orphanage, he realized that it not only provided rooms and everything that was needed for a regular household, but it commanded a rather impressive number of classrooms, as cramped as they were, as well as a small area for recreational activities. It certainly was kept in good conditions, and the children looked happy, but his violet eyes still searched restlessly. After a while, he frowned.

"Were you looking for someone in particular, perhaps?" the old woman hedged cautiously, but not unkindly. He slanted a glance towards her, a little uncomfortable with her intense stare, and nodded. "I saw a field trip of a sort a few days back and saw some of the kids."

"Oh?" she looked surprised. "I didn't know someone had interacted with them."

"No," he said quickly. "I just watched." There was a bit of an awkward silence between the two of them as both wondered on what to say. The old woman out of social grace, and the man out of knowing that if he'd said anything about his lack of experience in children, she wouldn't take him too seriously. He internally winced at that too because he hadn't dressed up for the occasion. It had been impulsive to come here, just as it had impulsive to look up the address on the web the day before, and he was dressed like a city punk with a more dangerous edge. If it weren't for the fact that he'd managed to restrain himself to intelligent speech and absence of obscene language, he had a feeling they would politely ask him to leave. As it was, he was far out of his element and only his curiosity was driving him now. He just had a feeling he should see the girl for some reason.

"Well," the woman looked markedly confused. "Do you happen to have a description?" He pondered for a moment whether or not he should just leave, but then that nagging feeling came back and he surrendered to its powers. "Pink hair. The girl had pink hair. I think her name was—"

"Koharu," the woman finished flatly. The man looked cautiously for a moment while the woman mustered up the will to be polite and cheerful once again. "Ah, forgive me. Your…choice took me by surprise. Most of the potential parents," he shuddered at the word. "are a little taken aback by her rather…_vivacious _nature. I suppose that she would be noticeable. But if you want to see her," she drifted off, gesturing vaguely towards the classroom door. "Please," he said cordially. It almost sickened him at how polite he was being, but he supposed that swearing up a storm wouldn't go over well here. Truthfully, he didn't know why he cared.

The woman led him out of the classroom filled with small, midget sized desks and through a hallway. After a few turns and one door later, it opened up into a fair sized room. He slowed as he approached the doorway. The room that it opened to was what looked like to be the recreation room for some of the less energetic children. Blocks of all sizes, mathematical toys and puzzles littered the floor, thinking games lined the shelves, and hands on projects were sectioned off to a tiled area where paint, putty, and crayons would be an easily cleaned mess. A few women lingered around the walls, chatting as they kept watch out of the corners of their eyes. The children, fewer than there were outside, paid them little mind and went about their business with excited, though subdued, chatter.

The silver haired man was a little surprised to find the pink haired girl from yesterday curled up in one corner of the room, a book in one hand, and a pencil and notebook sitting on the floor next to her. Every once in a while, she would pause and jot down something on her notebook with a look of utter confusion or interest written across her face. "She's a bit of a loner," the old woman started, surprising the man with her loose slang term. "And slightly volatile, but extraordinarily intelligent. She spends most of her time working with puzzles or mind games, sometimes even going into the math section when it's quiet."

"What's she doing now?"

"I'm not too sure," the woman admitted, then turned towards him. "Would you like to find out?"

He gave her a baleful look. He'd asked the question because he wanted to know, but she'd phrased her answer in a way that clearly hinted he should go find out for himself. Letting out an inward sigh, he stepped into the room of children, trying to hide his discomfort as efficiently as possible. He wasn't used to seeing so many kids, and once they noticed him, all eyes turned to him while hushed whispered exploded all over the room. He resisted the urge to rub the back of his neck out of nervousness, but to his surprise the whispers disappeared nearly as quickly as they had come and the children went back to their business, albeit aware of his presence.

Koharu looked up almost as soon as he was next to her. "You're the man from before," she said simply as he sat down next to her, leaning his back against the wall like she was. Her eyes were curious and a little wary, and suddenly he understood why all the kids here seemed to have a little more knowledge to them. It's because there was nobody to coddle them quite like a parent could. He nodded and extended his hand. "I'm Hidan." Her little hand disappeared under his, but she put up a brave front. "I'm Koharu." For some reason, Hidan thought that the name didn't fit her at all. Looking down at her other hand, he noticed its immobile state and gestured towards it. "How's it feel?"

"O-okay," she said, fingering the bandage that had been wrapped firmly around her knuckles. He would say she looked a little bashful that he'd caught her in the act, but after she shot a scathing look into space, he figured she wasn't feeling particularly guilty about her actions. She shook herself out of it, though, and turned to him. "My thumb hurts though."

"Your thumb?" she nodded, looking down at her book. "Make a fist," he instructed. She did, and he laughed. She let the fist drop hastily, bending over her book with a red face as he chuckled. "Well no wonder it hurts! You're doing it the wrong way."

"Th-there's a right way?" Koharu hadn't really thought that there was a right or wrong way to hit someone. You just made them hurt, didn't you? He held out his own fist and made something that reminded Koharu of the rocks lining the playground. He pointed to his thumb as she stared. "See this? You have to put your thumb on the _outside _of your fingers, not the _inside. _You could break your thumb if you hit too hard the other way."

Koharu looked panicked and stared down at her hurting thumb. "It's not broken is it?"

"Chill, there's no way it could be." She relaxed instantly and a silence descended around them. Before it could get too awkward the man jumped for a topic. "What are you reading, anyway?"

"Oh, i-it's just something that I picked up." The man lifted it for second so he could read the cover and raised his eyebrow. "Pride and Prejudice? Isn't that a little advanced for you?" Isn't that little advanced for anybody nowadays? Just what the hell was a book like that doing in a place like this? "Well," she started shyly. "I don't really understand it. Mikasa-san let me borrow it because she finished it and told me I wouldn't but…"

"But," he prompted. She looked around, like she was scared of being overheard. When she thought she was safe, which the man found extremely amusing, she answered. "It's kind of the point." He blinked at her, perplexed. "To not understand?"

"Mm-hm," she nodded. "I can learn like this. See?" she pointed to the notebook and pencil between them and he found that it was covered in words. Most of them he understood, but there were a few that he had no clue what they meant, much less how they were pronounced. "I read, and when I find a word I don't get, I write it down. Then, I go to the dictionary," she pointed to a thick textbook a little ways a way. "And figure out what it means. I don't always remember the words I learn, but I do learn."

"That's pretty cool. Most kids your age wouldn't bother. Hell I wouldn't bother with that kind of stuff even now."

"Is it weird?"

"Nah," he shrugged, noticing her soft worried tone of voice. "It just means that you'll be smarter than everybody else, which is always a good thing." She grinned at that and the two began a conversation anew, chatting away as the other children realized that the man wasn't going to mingle like the usual adults would.

It was a long time before either of them moved, and when they did, it was for Koharu to show him how to properly operate a stencil. They crowded around a small table, his much large frame dwarfing hers as she explained that you could use stencils to make really cool shapes. He grinned as he watched her pick out a simple oval and looked at the table before them. It was littered with square paper full of singular shapes and he spied the oval on several pages. She came back with her stencil and a piece of paper and proceeded to trace and trace and trace until she had something that looked like an overly complicated flower. He smiled as she measured with her eyes the proper distance from the previous oval to the one she was making and thought that her particular eye for perfection was cute.

He ruffled her hair on impulse when she proudly showed him the completed shape and she beamed at him.

It continued like this for another hour. Her showing him her various favorite stations and places, and he patiently watching her do it. Or, really not patiently at all. Patience wasn't needed when she showed him because without fail, she would have come up with a different, more complicated way of using whatever tool was provided than what the instructions said to do. At one point, he found that she was a bit of a rule breaker too. When he informed her of that she responded with a prim, "Nobody ever learned from doing it _right,_" and continued to use to use the ceramic bowl as a jackhammer to break apart a pair of especially stubborn plastic blocks. His roar of laughter turned a few heads and an amazed stare from one of the women, but he barely noticed.

It wasn't long before they migrated outside and she showed him her favorite place. He wasn't surprised when it wasn't anywhere near the playground, and instead thought it suited her very much to choose a place out of direct line of sight from the supervisors. He was understanding that she really didn't like being around the children here and instead chose places where she could slip away. But, as she tugged incessantly at his hand, he knew she was just starving for the right kind of company. He was strangely proud that he fit the criteria.

She led him up to a mighty tree and he watched as she transformed herself into a monkey and scurried up the trunk, using breaks in the bark as handholds until she reached a branch. "Come on Hidan-san! It's really cool up here!"

"Coming." With a powerful leap, his hands snagged the branch that she was sitting on and pulled himself up until he could shift his weight and instead push himself up. Twisting, he sat his butt on the tree limb and looked to her awed face and laughed. Lifting his hand upwards, he pitched his voice so it sounded unnecessarily heroic. "Onward, fair maiden!" She giggled and climbed higher, her bare feet gripping the bark expertly. He mildly thought that that must hurt, but figured that if she wasn't bothered by it then he shouldn't either. "This is my favorite place," she exclaimed, looking over her shoulder at him. He smiled. "Why's that?"

"It has the bestest view ever!"

"Best," he corrected automatically. "Best or very best."

"Not bestest?"

"Nope." She frowned at him. "I heard two older girls say it, though."

"Teenagers are stupid fu—_heads_." She blinked. "You were going to say something else."

"No I wasn't."

"Liar."

"Your right."

"So what were you going to say?"

"Well that's for me to know and for you to wonder about."

"I'll find out."

"You probably will."

"Then why hide it?"

"Because it's funny to see you angry." Koharu puffed out her cheeks in anger and instead resumed climbing the tree while Hidan laughed behind her. She was cute when she was angry, he realized. She settled herself in a branch and he did the same to one close to her. It was a bit of a tight fit, but he realized why she liked it up here. It was a safe haven, cozy and secluded. All around you were broad green leaves and the smell of fresh air was abundant. A small gap in the leaves revealed a rather spectacular view and the two of them put their heads together in order to see better. Just a little ways away was a nearby lake, complete with some swans. The lake was surrounded by trees but it opened up a little at the far end to reveal towering skyscrapers that marked the start of the more urban parts of the city. "Sometimes," she said softly. "When I come up here I dream I'm in one of those buildings."

"You like heights?"

"Yeah," she softly responded, nodding her head. "I've never seen the city, but I can see the lights when it's dark. I think it would be really pretty."

Hidan lived in a penthouse on top of one of those skyscrapers, the tallest actually, but he didn't say anything. He didn't know why. It was on impulse. Instead, he examined the girl. She was pretty small, but her spirit was kind of like a little sun. All bright and warm, but she had a kind of cool intelligence about her too that he thought was remarkable for someone her age. Still, something was nagging at him since he started to talk to her and he figured now was as good as ever to voice it. "Say, Koharu?"

"Yeah?" she moved back a ways to make room for both of them to sit. Once they were comfortable, he broached the topic.

"Back when I first saw you when you punched the girl, good one by the way, she said something that I don't quite understand." That was a lie. He understood, he just wanted clarification. "What, Hidan-san?"

"She said something about you not having a name."

It went eerily quiet and for a moment Hidan was smacking himself because well great he'd just gone and fucked things up. But then she came back from her faraway look and stared at him with eyes that were so sad they tugged on his thought-to-be-nonexistent heartstrings. "I don't really have one," she admitted quietly. "When mommy and daddy put me here when I was a baby, they didn't tell the ladies my name. The ladies never actually saw my parents though, so I guess they couldn't really." She began to pick at a leaf, breaking it into itty bitty pieces as Hidan watched. "All the other kids' parents didn't want them either, but at least they had names. I'm the only one who doesn't, so they just called me Koharu." She shrugged. "It's not a bad name, I guess. I just wish—"

"Sakura."

"Huh?"

Hidan studied her startled expression for a moment, wondering if maybe this wasn't a good idea. But then again, he thought it suited her better. It was prettier, _and _it matched her hair. "Sakura," he said again. "I think you should be called Sakura."

"Sakura?" She could tell she was a little confused, but she didn't outright reject it which was good. He shrugged. "I think it fits better than Koharu. It sounds better."

He waited for a moment, worried that he'd somehow just screwed everything up, but then she smiled a smile so bright that it lit up her entire face and eyes squinted, glittering like jewels behind the lids. "Sakura," she repeated a flush coming to her cheeks. "I like it better too." Maybe he was undermining the importance of giving someone a name, but it was like he said: it just fit better. And besides, it was on impulse and now that he'd said it he liked it. A lot. He grinned at her and affirmed. "Sakura."

A few minutes later, as Hidan was giving her a shoulder ride back to the orphanage, she slipped and called him Hida-kun instead of her usual Hidan-san. He didn't bother to correct her.

On his way out the door he informed the old lady that he would drop by tomorrow, and with a tight hug from the newly christened Sakura, he was out the door.

He did come back the next day. And the next, and the one after that, and even the one after that until his presence was commonplace. Sakura became happier and happier every time he came and he was becoming more comfortable around her. Comfortable enough that sometimes he'd forget he was with a little kid and start swearing. She would always laugh when he made her promise not to repeat any of his outbursts—it was like a running joke between the two of them.

It wasn't long until his housemates began to notice the change in their once brooding, angry, and explosive partner in crime, but they didn't really say anything.

One day, when he walked into the house he occasionally shared with those same come-and-go type of housemates, he went straight to the computer. One them was already using it, and while there was another computer, he just didn't feel like trudging upstairs. "Move, Deidara."

"Wow, not even a curse. What happened out there? Someone finally decided to use the fire hydrant to wash out your mouth?"

"Fucker."

"Aaand he's back." Hidan rolled his eyes, knowing that he must seems strangely subdued, but he figured it was just a byproduct of being with Sakura. "Just move, asshole."

"What's wrong with the computer upstairs?" Impatient, the silver haired man hauled the blond out of the seat and deposited him, rather unkindly, to the floor. He landed with a yelp and curse. "Dude! What the hell!"

"It'll just take a few fucking seconds," he responded loudly, suddenly realizing just how badly Sakura had him hooked. He couldn't even wait to boot up the other computer upstairs because he wanted the information _now._ He heard Deidara huff behind him but offer no more resistance. Distantly, he realized that the blond should have started a fight already, but for some reason hadn't. Whatever it was, he hoped it held because he was just about to drop a bomb. One that he was sure even the pyromaniac wouldn't appreciate. "What's so important, anyways?" Deidara complained, falling into a leather couch. Hidan's fingers were typing in the necessary words into a search engine as he answered. He hadn't meant to, but it was out of his mouth before he could stop to think about it. Impulse.

"Adoption fees."

Somewhere in the kitchen, he heard glass break.


	2. Chapter 2

Theme II: Perseverance

"What do you mean '_adoption fees'?_" The voice was much more calm than he thought it should have any right to be, and that worried him. Just a little. He didn't turn to look at the speaker, instead focusing on choosing which site Google had given him. He stared at them for a moment before going back to the search engine and typing in _'konoha orphanage' _instead. "Just what I said. Adoption fees."

"And why," he was coming out of the kitchen now, walking with deliberate steps until he was right behind Hidan. "Would you have _any _reason to look that up?" On the couch, Deidara sat like a statue. Hidan let out a sigh and spun the swivel chair to face the speaker that was currently towering menacingly over him.

The man was huge, reaching a height of 6'5'' and built like a rhino. His skin was tan and leathery, scars crossing all up his arms, chest, neck and legs. Some of them were stitched together, the black threads never have been removed. Hidan one time asked about them and the fucker had responded by saying that he grew up during a war. He was drafted as a teen and while out on a scouting party a grenade exploded close to him. The shrapnel had torn him to pieces and the lack of a proper doctor meant that the stitches were done by amateurs. They dug too deep and caught some muscle instead of just the skin, and by the time that the wounds had healed without the aid of proper disinfectant, the muscle had sealed around the stitches and removing them would be impossible without amazing amounts of pain and damage. Now, he could probably get rid of them, but the process, as he put it anyways, would be too long and expensive to bother doing. They were a bit disturbing to look at, especially the ones that had sliced right across his face, but you got used to them. As if that wasn't enough, poison gas had caused the capillaries in his sclera to explode, dying them permanently an angry pink against the vivid green of his iris. His hair was long and stringy and his face was always in a scowl. All in all he was scary as shit to look at and the fact that he was quite intentionally cranking up the intimidation levels in hopes of getting Hidan to spill would have made a lesser man run for it.

Hidan was pretty nonplussed though. He'd been working with Kakuzu for a little over six years, and even though he was a good two decades older, Kakuzu's scariness had somehow lost its charm over the years. Of course, everyone in the house seemed to have lost their scary card. Just goes to show that familiarity can take the fear out of anything.

Hidan sighed, tilting his head back and giving the man above him a scowl. "Are you freaking out that I might blow your funds, stitch-face?"

"Holy shit he's not swearing," Deidara murmured in the background, awed but mostly ignored. Kakuzu glared. "You said _adoption _fees, Hidan. I'd like to know why." His deep voice had a strange catch to it that made it sound more like a growl, and the last word was drawn out so deliberately that Hidan knew the man was serious. Hidan couldn't blame him. For the past two months that he'd been seeing Sakura he'd become disgustingly docile, and he knew that it was putting his fellow housemates on edge just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Grunting, he figured he couldn't hide it forever.

"I'm adopting someone." It wasn't even a 'I'm _thinking _of adopting someone' and that should have been their first clue that Hidan was, for once, dead serious about something. They didn't catch it though because they were both roaring with laughter. The silver haired male rolled his eyes and turned so he was facing the computer again. At the sound of his typing fingers and the way he seemed to be actually _reading _what he was researching, the laughter sobered. Deidara was the first to speak, with a sort of disbelieving half chuckle. "You serious? Like, serious-serious?"

"Serious-serious."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"Seri—"

_"__Enough,_" Kakuzu interjected, already impatient enough to be agitated. "This is idiotic, even for you, Hidan."

"Oi!"

"And I want to know what on earth could cause that phenomenon so you better open that trap that for _once _isn't spewing something vulgar and tell me _what the fuck is going on._"

"Chill out," Hidan yelled, indignant. "It's not like the world is ending or anything. I'm just adopting someone." Behind him, he thought he saw Kakuzu shudder. Deidara jumped up from his seat. "Wait. Adopting a _person _or a _pet _'cause that would make a hell of a difference."

He could feel their eyes on the back of his neck and it was bugging him, he'd read the same sentence three times now and still didn't understand what it was saying because he couldn't focus. After a silence in which they figured he wouldn't answer, Deidara finally got impatient enough to shove his head rudely into Hidan's personal space and read over his shoulder. He pulled back with a yelp. "A _person! _Hidan you can't adopt _a person!_"

"And why the hell not?" He knew Sakura. Sakura would be much happier in the penthouse with him and all the other guys than at that place where everyone still _insisted _that she was strange. Hell the lady that ran the place was constantly trying to turn his head to other kids, whether or not she meant for him to adopt more than one or to adopt someone else entirely, he wasn't sure. But because he was cynical and defensive, he thought the worst of their actions and figured that they just wanted Sakura to be miserable.

Deidara had a look of utter panic on his face when Hidan finally turned around to look at him. Once the blond realized that he had the attention he wanted, he raised his hands and performed a series of actions that were mostly unnecessary and dramatically raised his voice. "People _aren't pets, _Hidan! You can't just adopt one!"

"It's an orphanage, Barbie. It's not like I'm pulling her off the streets."

"_Her_?" Kakuzu seethed, clenching his big fists at his side. Behind him, the glass cup that he had dropped in the kitchen lay shattered over the tile, and for a moment Hidan was distracted just by how shiny it looked. He gave Kakuzu a dry look. He'd known the old man for a pretty long time and judging by how he looked right now, he could tell that the big man was just a few seconds short of panicking. Of course, Kakuzu's version of panic would be any other person's version of blind rage rampage. He _really _didn't want to be the one that had to answer Pein for that. Kakuzu, for all his genius, didn't really know how to hold in his rage when he snapped.

"_Easy, _stitch-face," he said slowly, holding his hands up in a pacifying way. "Look. You all know that I'm not the one to be the voice of fucking reason, but for once it's you two shit heads that need to calm down."

"_Hidan—"_

"Deidara's meeting her tomorrow."

"What?"

"I am?" Hidan nodded his head, staring between the two of them with a—dare they say it?—thoughtful look. "I met her about two months ago. She's comes up to about my knee and gave a girl nearly twice her size a black eye for bullying her. She's four—turning five in the winter, has pink hair, green eyes, likes to read, good at math but doesn't really like doing it, can't draw for shit without a stencil, and up until she met me, wished she had a name."

They stood shocked before him, the rage drained from Kakuzu to be replaced with bafflement. Deidara was still as stone, mouth agape before he managed to scrape together his wits enough to ask a question. Even then, his head was whirred almost too fast to pick one that he wanted to ask. When did Hidan give a shit? She had no _name?_ Pink hair? Two _months _ago?

"Wait—wait…just…what?"

"Your meeting her tomorrow."

"What do you mean she doesn't have a name?"

"Better yet what do you mean until she met _you?_" Hidan shrugged, sagging into the swivel chair and idly spinning himself from one side to another. "Her parents never named her when they gave her the orphanage. The place named her Koharu but I didn't think it fit so I named her Sakura."

Kakuzu slapped a hand over his eyes. "Kami-sama if there were ever a time…" Leave it up to Hidan to over simplify the most profound of things. Beside Kakuzu, Deidara seemed to be coming in and out of shock.

"You—you _named _her? Hidan this is a human. _Human! _As in, _not a PET!_"

"I _know _you little fucker! Why the hell do you think I'm adopting her?!"

"Since when were _we,_" he put a strong emphasis on the last word, gesturing wildly about the room. "Parenting material?!"

"We're _criminals," _Kakuzu growled, adding his two cents. Hidan looked at them like they were crazy. "Since when did that ever fucking stop us!"

"Just—I can't. I so fucking can't."

"Suck it up, pyro-freak. Your meeting her tomorrow."

"And who the hell says I'll go!"

"Because she wants to see you and what she wants she's gonna god damn get!"

"Oh my _gawd, _he's turned into an old woman."

"Look!" He jumped out of his chair, pulling back his shoulders to make him look taller. He scowled at them, both in obvious states of distraught. Kakuzu had his head dropped into his hands and he was rubbing small soothing circles around his temples. Deidara was pacing around the room, hands on hips as he tilted his head to the sky and bit his lip. At his loud order, they both stopped and gave baleful looks. "Look," he said again, quieter, holding out his hands as if to visually explain what he needed to. "I know it sounds crazy. Hell I _know _it's fucking crazy. It's a _shit load _of crazy," he looked at them pointedly. "But she's _so _worth it. I'm the very last person on this planet that would say something like this and you know it because every weekend I run an underground boxing ring and I _enjoy _seeing people get beat to shit, but I'm telling you she's special."

"Your fucking whipped."

"Addicted to a stress-reliever."

"_Yes,"_ he said, pointing to Kakuzu who had added that last comment. "And my goal is to get _all _of you addicted because she _is _a stress reliever and a damn good one. You forget everything but what she's doing because she's always doing _something. _You know what her favorite thing to say is? 'Nobody ever learned by doing it _right' _yeah, you heard me. That's what she says every time someone tells her she's doing something wrong."

Kakuzu gave a harsh bark of laughter, and Hidan paused because it was just so uncharacteristic of the surly man. "Hidan," he growled, rubbing his eyes. "You can't adopt her."

"The fuck I can't!"

"How are you going to provide for her? Hmm?" Hidan opened his mouth to argue, but he didn't get the chance. "Oh sure we've got money. We've got shit loads of money. But that's not what I'm talking about fuck face. Brats need attention. You can't just stick them in some school and expect them to be satisfied. No, their selfish like that. They'll suck up all your focus until you can't even think straight and that is something we _cannot _afford."

"Oh come off it!" Hidan yelled, flipping the tan man the bird and pointing at Deidara when it looked like he would open his mouth. "You too, blondie! Now listen, I'm not thinking of being a parent. Hell the very word gives me the creeps, but I _can _give her a better place to be. I mean, look at where we live!"

He gestured widely to the high-end penthouse that they currently resided at, the ceiling to floor windows that made up one wall of the living room showing a wonderful view of Tokyo. Kakuzu slapped a hand to his face. "What the hell do you think I'm trying to tell you?!" He roared, finally fed up with this entire situation. "You can't just give a kid a place to stay and expect that it be it! They need attention!"

"That doesn't sound so hard to give."

"I'm done, un." The blond got up and left. "Distract him while I call Pein."

"Oi! Don't bring carrot-top into this!" He made to go after Deidara, but was stopped when a blocky, brick-like fist slammed into his nose. He heard bone crunch and felt the warm spurt of blood and then thoughts of Sakura promptly flew out of his mind. All he could see was red. "You _fucker!"_

Deidara casually walked down the hall, ignoring the sounds of destruction going on behind him as he made his way to the cordless phone. When he reached the kitchen, he swiped it off of the countertop and dialed a well-known number before resting most of his weight on the island. The kitchen was mostly pristine, the only culprits daring to mar the picture-perfect cleanliness were a few guilty beer bottles and one lonely box of pizza. He lifted the lid out of curiosity and frowned when it was discovered that no pizza was left. Down the hall he could hear furniture being shifted around amongst the screams and grunts of fighting, but his attention was spliced when the dial tone finally ended with a click.

_"__What?" _The voice was toneless and irritated sounding. Deidara inspected his nails, shoving the phone between his shoulder and ear when he discovered a particularly stubborn bit of clay adhered to his nail bed. Behind him, something shattered. _"That better not have been the vase."_

"Nah," Deidara responded, knowing that their leader was referring to the stolen artifact they were holding for ransom. "I already put that into the safe, un."

_"__Hn. What's the purpose of this call."_

"The apocalypse, actually, yeah." Deidara responded smarmily, sneering into the receiver. Pein always sounded like he had a nine-foot pole up his ass. _"I assume it has something to do with Hidan. You all seem incapable civilized communication when based with each other."_

Ignoring Pein's rather rude comment, Deidara sniffed haughtily. "Kinda hard when you've stuck an underground boxer overseer, a drug lord, and a bomber together, don't you think?" Finally getting the clay out of his nail, he again grabbed the cordless and ambled around the room when Kakuzu and Hidan came barreling in, bloody, and red in the face. They paused to look at each other for a moment, caught their breath, and with one nasty look and a curse, were at it again. Deidara lightly jumped over the pair when they tumbled to the floor in a mess of limbs and explicative language. "Anyways, un," the blond grunted, talking a little more loudly in order to be heard properly. "Hidan decided that he was going to be a bigger idiot than normal and adopted someone." A silence. _"WHAT!"_

"Well," the bomber amended. "He hasn't done it _yet, _but he was ready to. Kicked me off the computer and was looking up adoption fees before we told him he'd finally gone off the deep end." Through his explanation, Deidara could hear the slightly labored breaths of their leader and knew that the pierced man was probably seething.

_"__And how, exactly, did this situation come about?" _Deidara shrugged even though he knew Pein couldn't see him. "I dunno. He just started disappearing for a few days and when he came back its like he turned into a fucking poodle. All docile and shit. Next thing we know he's spouting crap about naming a kid and bringing her home."

_"__Her." _Deidara laughed. "Yeah, that was our reaction too. If I hadn't known Hidan I would have thought he'd turned into a pedophile."

_"__And a name."_

"I think he thinks she's a pet."

"SHE'S NOT A PET!"

_"__He's still alive." _Deidara looked over at the struggling pair, noticing that they had pretzeled themselves into some kind of professional wrestling move. "You want him out the window, or what?"

_"__Yes."_

"Yo stich-face! Carrot-top wants him through the window!" The big man immediately complied, trying to struggle his way out of the hold and then drag an uncooperative albino to the glass. A sigh was heard on the other end of the line. _"Call me that again and I'll have Konan set on you." _Deidara's lip twitched but he offered no response. _"How long has this been happening."_

"About a month or two. He seriously wants to adopt her."

_"__No."_

"That's what we said. For once it's he's serious about something. And whipped, too."

_"__No." _was the same, monotone response. Deidara ran a hand through his hair, noticing the progress of the two fighters. "So since Hidan isn't going to let himself be thrown out the window, what the hell should we do?"

It was a legitimate question. They all may be in the same sect of organized crime, and they may have a quote, "leader" but really none of them could be controlled. They did whatever the fuck they felt like, when they felt like doing it.

_"__Get me Hidan."_

Deidara held up the phone. "Oi! You two freaks, yeah! Pein wants to talk to you!" They broke apart, sending nasty glares and wiping blood from their faces. When Hidan turned to look at him, Deidara tossed the phone his way and Kakuzu stalked off. Probably to go wash his face off. Deidara fell into one of the couches and watched Hidan trying to recover. "What?" he snarled into the line.

_"__What are you doing?"_

"Fuck. Ya'll are pansies, you know that? I said I'm adopting someone."

_"__No."_

"Well what're you going to do about it? _Fire _me."

_"__Hidan. She'll die." _For a moment all Hidan could process was a blankness. And then fury. "So you're fucking telling me," He started dangerously. "That you're going _To FUCKING KILL HER!" _Deidara's eyebrows shot high into his hairline. Hidan was red in the face, a vein bulging on his forehead, and every muscle strained with the force of his rage. It was different seeing him react so strongly in a person's favor. Usually, when he got this angry it meant that whoever pissed him off was going to be found as a corpse. As quickly as it came, though, Hidan's anger vanished. "Oh," He said shortly, then frowned into the receiver. "Fine. But if someone else tries to adopt her I'm gonna hand their asses to them." And with that, he ended the call and tossed the phone back at the blond. Deidara juggled with it for a moment before looking up to Hidan. "What'd he say?"

"None of your fucking business, Barbie." He stalked towards the kitchen sink and blasted the cold water on high. Cupping his hands under the stream, he began to furiously rub his face, washing the blood clean. "Hey," He called. "Come over here and fix my nose."

"You called me a Barbie, you crazy asshole."

"Then don't act like one. What, does a broken bone make you queasy, or something?"

"I'm going to kill you."

"Oh, fuck you for giving Pein the idea to throw me out the window by the way."

"You're very welcome, shit head."

"Get over here."

"That sounded suspiciously like a come-on, freak." Hidan snorted, blood spurting up at the action. He seemed nonplussed though and just continued to wash it away. "Did you want it to be one?" Deidara's eye began to twitch. He was challenging him, and it was working. That pissed Deidara off even more. "What," Hidan taunted, smirking at the blond over his shoulder. "I thought you were used to the sight of blood, since you see it every month."

He threw the phone at him. "Fuck you, Hidan!" The white-haired man laughed. "Sorry. I only do chicks."

"That's up for debate, actually." Hidan shook his head and bent down, dousing his face yet again with water. The blood was stemming slightly, but not by much. "Dude, seriously. Get over here and fix my nose." Scowling, Deidara complied. But since he didn't want to seem like he was taking orders, he tugged Hidan's nose back into place as violently and painfully as possible. "Ow!" Hidan yelped, ripping his head out of the blonds grasp and feeling his nose. It was already swollen, and it hurt every time he prodded it but he could feel that it had been set correctly. Didn't mean that he had to be so harsh about it, though. "What the fuck man?"

Deidara shot him a dirty look, running his hand through his hair before turning away. Picking up the cordless from the floor, he placed it back into the charger before stalking off. "One of these days I'm going to blow you up, Hidan."

Behind him, as he was walking away Deidara heard the foul-mouthed man mutter something, but he couldn't make out the words. Only that it was slightly indignant in tone.

"Sakura'd kill you, you pansy ass fucker."

* * *

><p>AN: Significantly shorter than the first chapter, but these are snap shots. I'm so glad that this got such a positive response! Thanks to all that reviewed!


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